HomePublications Pathways To Homelessness Among Caribbean Youth 15-25 In Toronto

May 4, 2005Joseph Springer, Terry Roswell and Cheryl "Bela" McPherson

Pathways To Homelessness Among Caribbean Youth 15-25 In Toronto

Principal Organization: Ryerson University

Principal Investigator: Joseph Springer

Researchers conducted 34 interviews with Caribbean homeless youth in Toronto. The majority of their respondents were between the ages of 17-24, were unemployed, and had a grade 11 education on average. A common pathway to homelessness was a breakdown of the family or other key relationships, and for women this often involved abuse. Participants explained that any contact they had with the police was negative and believed it was strongly related to racism and discrimination. A key finding of the project was that race and racism were important elements to understanding youth homelessness in Canada.

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Acknowledgement of Traditional Land

We would like to acknowledge this sacred land on which the Wellesley Institute operates. It has been a site of human activity for 15,000 years. This land is the territory of the Huron-Wendat and Petun First Nations, the Seneca, and most recently, the Mississaugas of the Credit River. The territory was the subject of the Dish With One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant, an agreement between the Iroquois Confederacy and Confederacy of the Ojibwe and allied nations to peaceably share and care for the resources around the Great Lakes.

Today, the meeting place of Toronto is still the home to many Indigenous people from across Turtle Island and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work in the community, on this territory.

Revised by the Elders Circle (Council of Aboriginal Initiatives) on November 6, 2014

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